The Charge

Opening Statement

The title character of Showtime's Dexter has seen and done it all over
the last five seasons, stalking and taking out killers and bad guys of all
shapes and sizes. Who will be the next to enter Dexter's kill room? Oh, I don't
know, how about…God?

Facts of the Case

Life is good for Dexter Morgan (Michael C. Hall, Six Feet Under), who has settled
into a comfortable daily routine as a police scientist, single father, and
serial-killer-who-satisfies-his-murderous-desires-by-preying-on-other-killers.

Dexter's world is soon rocked, though, by two new faces. First is Brother
Sam (Mos, formerly known as Mos Def, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the
Galaxy), a reformed criminal who has turned his life around by devoting
himself to his faith. Second is the Doomsday Killer, a mysterious figure
murdering people in symbolic ways taken straight from the Book of
Revelation.

Elsewhere, Dexter's homicide detective sister Debra (Jennifer Carpenter, Quarantine) is promoted to lieutenant
over the more experienced Detective Batista (David Zayas, The Expendables). Detective
Quinn spirals into a self-destructive route of drinking and partying over doing
his job, Lt. LaGuerta (Lauren Velez) struggles with bureaucratic ups and downs
of being promoted to police captain, and comic relief lab geek Masuka (C.S. Lee)
puts up with a revolving door of interns under his wing.

The Evidence

The big deal about this season is that it introduces religion into Dexter's
world. This would seem incongruous, considering what Dexter gets up to when no
one is watching, but the spiritual aspects of the season-long arc are not about
Dexter seeing the light, but questioning the light.

Here's the thing about Dexter: He has his life just as he likes it. He has
his job, his son, his sister and his friends, and he has his killing bad guys on
the side. In previous seasons, the villain is not necessarily the villain
because he or she is a murderer, but because he or she threatens to disrupt or
change Dexter's way of life. Following the events of season five, however,
Dexter has now reached the point where he starts to question his murderous
impulses, what he calls his "dark passenger." Although he states that
he's learned to live with his dark passenger, he is nonetheless drawn to Brother
Sam, a former criminal who seems to have changed his ways. Dexter's
"friendship" with Brother Sam is secretly his study of the man, as
Dexter tries to sort out how or if a person's inner darkness can be replaced
with light. Dexter's question this time around isn't whether he can free himself
of the darkness—he's accepted that the darkness will always be a part of
him—but whether he can free another person from it.

All this is some interesting food for thought, but it's all talky and
introspective, and not very visual. Fortunately, we've got the Doomsday Killer
on hand, offering the other half of the religious discussion by hacking up
bodies and arranging them in gory tableaus (get used to that word,
"tableau," because you'll be hearing it a lot this season). It's all
about apocalyptic visions and disturbing imagery from the Book of Revelation.
Think somewhere between the Saw films and The Abominable Dr. Phibes, and you'll
get the idea. The Doomsday Killer doesn't quite have the intensity of some of
the show's best villains of seasons past, but that's only because the stakes are
less personal this time around. The villain this time isn't someone Dexter knows
and is close to, but is instead a thematic villain, representing the darker side
of Dexter's questions, just as Brother Sam represents its light side.

It all sounds like heavy, dark stuff, and I suppose it is, but, fortunately,
Dexter exists in just enough of a heightened reality that viewers can
have some fun with it. The show's gallows humor is one of its biggest selling
points. Among Dexter's wry observations of life around him, Deb's abrasive
attitude and vulgar language, and the various quirky "one-off"
characters our heroes encounter along the way—not to mention the bright,
colorful Miami setting—the show never gets too dark for its own good,
despite the overall dark subject matter.

The Dexter writers have, at times, struggled with what to do with the
show's supporting cast, often coming up with subplots for the sake of subplots
that distract from the main story. This time around, however, the supporting
characters are all given something interesting to do, and all tied in one way or
another with the season-long arc. Mostly, this has to do with Deb's promotion to
lieutenant, essentially making her the other characters' boss. It's great fun to
get Deb out of her comfort zone and having to stand up for herself, and Jennifer
Carpenter does some of her best work to date this season. Zayas continues to be
likable as Batista, Desmond Harrington (Rescue Me) nicely depicts Quinn's ongoing
spiral of self-destructive behavoir, and C.S. Lee easily balances Masuka's
combination of brainy and goofy.

This season's guest actors do good work as well. Edward James Olmos (Battlestar Galactica) plays a wise mentor
type, with Colin Hanks (Roswell) as
his conflicted young student. Hanks plays his character broad and over the top,
while Olmos plays his close to the chest, with a lot of subtlety. Their back and
forth interactions lead to one of the season's biggest shock moments. Dexter now
has a nanny, Batista's little sister (Aimee Garcia), who gets a minor subplot of
her own, but mostly she's here to take care of Dexter's son while he's off
killing. A new detective, Anderson (Billy Brown, Cloverfield), joins Miami Metro, but
little is revealed about him, as the writers are clearly setting his character
up to be explored in future seasons.

The picture quality on this 1.78:1/1080p three-disc Blu-ray is stellar, with
an amazing level of detail to be seen, especially in the outdoor scenes, in
which you can practically feel the Miami heat coming off of everyone's sweaty
faces. Audio is good as well, perfectly balanced in Dolby 5.1 Surround. All of
the extras are available through BD-Live, including cast interviews and two
episodes each of fellow Showtime series House of Lies, Californication, and The Borgias.

The Rebuttal Witnesses

What to make of Dexter's voiceover? Every screenwriting class you've ever
taken has instructed you to never use voiceover, and yet we can all think of
those few examples where it's been used well. In Dexter, there are
numerous times in which the voiceover provides a clever observation or a witty
turn of phrase, but at other times it seems unnecessary, as the look on the
actor's face says all that's really needed to be said. Likewise, Dexter's
interior thought process is often illustrated by conversations with his late
father (James Remar, Ben 10 Ultimate
Alien). Again, sometimes these scenes between the two of them are powerful
and gripping, but sometimes they're just repeating what the audience already
knows.

Closing Statement

Dexter has been consistently good since day one, and this season is no
exception. The focus on spirituality and belief might be a turn off for some
hardcore fans, but the writers treat the subject in a purely Dexter-ish
way, so that the show doesn't lose any of what makes it so great.

The Verdict

Not guilty. And I'm not just saying that so I don't end up in Dexter's kill
room next.